et Imbecillitate Darwinian a. 



unscientific : to explain Nature by impos- 

 sibility, in pure unconsciousness of what you 

 are doing, is ridiculous. 



II. 



Any Quantity or Magnitude, considered in 

 a purely mathematical or quantitative way, 

 may be regarded as the outcome of a series of 

 continuous, successively accumulated minute 

 quantities or increments of which it is the 

 limit. And conversely, any such Quantity, 

 by the inverted process, continuous decrement y 

 will become as small as we please, till it 

 vanishes, or differs by no appreciable magni- 

 tude from zero, or nothing. 



It is this principle, variously manipulated 

 and applied, which has given such power 

 to modern mathematical analysis. It is 

 the potent instrument of discovery and in- 

 vestigation in its own sphere, the sphere of 



